LEED PLATINUM for Main Point Karlin

3 May, Prague – The Main Point Karlin project implemented by PSJ INVEST has become the first one in the Czech Republic to receive the LEED PLATINUM certificate from the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC). The building has reached the absolutely highest rating, which can be reached within this prestigious international rating system.

Quote from Ing. Martin Jaroš, the Chairman of the Board of Directors:

“We appreciate the certificate very much. This rating confirms that with LEED PLATINUM and a total of 87 points, the Main Point Karlin project of PSJ INVEST is the leader among the sustainable buildings not only in the Czech Republic but in the whole Europe as well.”

“The awareness that a Czech company and Czech architects are capable of designing and putting into operation a building, which is comparable with and, in many respects, surpasses the best buildings in the world – that is the absolutely groundbreaking message, which gives us all the hope of being trend-setters and not just trend-followers.”

Platinum as a challenge:

The Platinum rating was awarded to Main Point Karlin for achieving extraordinary results particularly in the fields of energy utilization, indoor environmental quality and innovations.

The energy efficiency of Main Point Karlin is thus better by up to 38 % in comparison with a standard office building defined by the ASHRAE standard.

PSJ INVEST adjusted the entire course of the project to the goal of constructing a leading sustainable building, which involved choosing the right architectonic design and site - Main Point Karlin has revitalized an old brownfield - and utilizing ingenious technical measures in the building. Already during the first stages of the project, the PSJ INVEST team included a number of environmental and efficiency-improving measures and established cooperation with the world’s leading experts, specifically the Albanese company based in New Year. The result of these efforts is a building, which represents the highest technological standard of the present times and features a number of original innovations, thanks to which the threshold of 80 points necessary for the Platinum certificate was exceeded by full 7 points. Thus, Main Point Karlin is the first building in Central and East Europe that can pride itself in having such high rating.

The building’s properties are user-friendly:

When the green and efficiency-oriented efforts are overdone, the result is dictatorship of technology over man, says Martin Jaroš. Regulation starts to dominate over environmental freedom. But this is not the case of MPK. At Main Point Karlin, we have achieved extraordinary savings in energy consumption but at the same time we have not deprived people of the freedom to go and open a window or to control environmental temperature on an individual basis, concludes Jaroš.

Quote from the President of the USGBC:

“Buildings are a prime example of how human systems integrate with natural systems,” said Rick

Innovation as the driving force behind development of sustainable buildings:

The LEED certification for Main Point Karlin was based on a number of innovative measures and environment-friendly features, which have a positive impact on the actual project, the indoor environment as well as wider surroundings. These features, for example, include the unique shell of the building with vertical glass-concrete wall piers working as sunshades, the system cooling the building using water from the river of Vltava and, for instance, inductions units, thanks to which the building achieves incomparably better standards of comfort, noise level and overall quality of indoor environment than is the case of standard office buildings of the highest category A .

LEED awards the following certification levels: Certified, Silver, Gold and – the highest one – Platinum. These are awarded according to the total number of points reached in each category, ranging from Certified with 40-49 points, through Silver with 50-59 points and Gold with 60-79 points, to Platinum with 80+ points.

Profile of PSJ INVEST, a.s.

The developer of the Main Point Karlin project is PSJ INVEST, a.s., which has operated in the Czech market for seventeen years. We have successfully implemented a number of development projects. Our portfolio consists of more than 181,000 square meters in office and shopping centers as well as commercial centers and industrial parks, apartment buildings and residential compounds. The best known completed projects include: the City Park Jihlava entertainment and shopping centre; the prestigious BB Centrum office compound in Prague 4 Michle; the Dvorana office centre in Prague; the Majdalenky residential compound in Brno; the Zelená louka apartment compound in Brno; the apartment buildings in the Pavlovova street in Jihlava; and the BMT storage and production site in Brno.

The U.S. Green Building Council is a nonprofit membership organization whose vision is a sustainable built environment within a generation. Its membership includes corporations, builders, universities, government agencies, and other nonprofit organizations. Since UGSBC’s founding in 1993, the Council has grown to more than 17,000 member companies and organizations, a comprehensive family of LEED® green building rating systems, an expansive educational offering, the industry’s popular Greenbuild International Conference and Expo (www.greenbuildexpo.org), and a network of 78 local chapters, affiliates, and organizing groups. For more information, visit www.usgbc.org.

About LEED®The LEED® (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Green Building Rating System™ is a feature-oriented rating system that awards buildings points for satisfying specified green building criteria. The six major environmental categories of review include: Sustainable Sites, Water Efficiency, Energy and Atmosphere, Materials and Resources, Indoor Environmental Quality and Innovation and Design. The certification levels are: Certified (40-49 points), Silver (50-59 points), Gold (60-79 points) and Platinum for 80 points and more. These levels of LEED green building certification are awarded based on the total number of points earned within each LEED category. LEED can be applied to all building types including new construction, commercial interiors, core & shell developments, existing buildings, homes, neighborhood developments, schools and retail facilities.. For more information, visit www.usgbc.org/LEED.